A group led by The Preiss Company, a Raleigh, N.C.-based student housing investor and operator, has bought the 486-bed Outpost San Marcos apartment complex on Post Road near Texas State University.

Company officials did not say how much they paid for the Outpost development, comprised of 162 units spread between six three-floor buildings. The 11.2-acre property was valued at $20.2 million in 2015 by the Hays Central Appraisal District.

San Marcos’ crowded multi-family residential real estate market is attractive to Priess, in part, because fewer than 15 percent of Texas State’s more than 36,000 undergraduates and graduate students live in university-owned housing, said Donna Preiss, the company’s founder and chief executive officer.

Preiss owns or operates 43 apartment developments near universities in 16 states. Their portfolio in Texas total nearly 4,000 beds including Axis West Campus off North Lamar Boulevard and University Village and University Estates at Austin both off East Riverside Drive in Austin.

Preiss was joined in the acquisition by Baltimore, Md.-based Criterion Holdings LLC and another private investment group. The property is held by a company organized as ZCP Outpost LLC with Lawrence Law PLLC, a Dallas-based commercial real estate law firm, as the registered agent, state corporate records state.

The Outpost was completed in 2004, according to city of San Marcos planning records.

COVER PHOTO: New owners say they intend to invest in upgrades to clubhouse and other shared amenities at the Outpost San Marcos, a 486-bed complex on Post Road. PHOTO VIA THE PREISS COMPANY

CORRECTION 02/17/16: An earlier version of this story should have said The Preiss Company owns or operates student housing development in 16 states, not 43.